Nadene Goldfoot
What fascinated me about our kings, Saul, David and Solomon is that they lived well over 3,000 years ago, and so much is documented about them in Kings I and II by Jeremiah, the prophet who lived in the 7th and 6th centuries BCE, who belonged to the priestly family of Anathoth near Jerusalem. We have to remember that "full writing-systems appear to have been invented independently at least four times in human history: first in Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) where cuneiform was used between 3400 and 3300 BCE, and shortly afterwards in Egypt at around 3200 BC.E
King Saul, son of Kish was of the tribe of Benjamin. The prophet Samuel had selected him to be king in view of the military threat of the Philistines. Saul at once organized a trained army and inflicted defeats on the enemy. David and his son, Solomon, were of the tribe of Judah.
King Solomon banishes Abiathar the Priest to Anathoth, "unto thine own fields". It is perhaps best known as the home town of the prophet Jeremiah (Jer 1:1; 29:27; 32:7-9). He delivers a prophecy of tribulation by the sword against the residents of Anathoth, who were plotting against him (Jer 11:21-23). Anathoth suffered greatly from the army of Nebuchadnezzar, and only 128 men returned to it from the Babylonian exile (Neh 7:27 in 538 BCE; Ezra 2:23). It lay about 3 miles north of Jerusalem.
So, Anathoth /ˈænəˌθɒθ/ is the name of one of the Levitical cities given to "the children of Aaron" in the tribe of Benjamin (Joshua 21:13–18; 1 Chronicles 6:54–60). Residents were called Antothites or Anetothites. The name of this town may be derived from a Canaanite goddess, `Anat. It is also given as the name of an Israelite person in 1 Chronicles (1 Chr 7:8), and in Nehemiah (Neh 10:19). Anathoth is mentioned as the native place of Abiezer the Anetothite, one of David's "thirty" (2 Samuel 23:27), and of Jehu, another of his mighty men (1 Chr 12:3)
Jeremiah began to prophecy in 625 BCE, so he wasn't right on site at the time of the kings, but must have been privy to notes about him from his family. There is about a 400 year span separating Jeremiah from the time of Solomon, but records were kept about our kings. This is the same time lapse as the Pilgrims of 1620 is to people living in 2021. It's a big difference. Records were kept in both time frames. That's the hard part to realize. Moses was a scribe and kept detailed records. He had learned this skill being a prince in Egypt and becoming educated along with any other prince of Egypt.
David, King of Israel from 1,000 to 960 BCE, was the youngest son of Jesse, grandson of Ruth, (a Moabite in Transjordan, kindred to the Israelites from Lot) and Boaz, a man of property of the tribe of Judah and was born in Bethlehem. Jesse feared King Saul, and for that reason, lived in Moab for a while. David conquered Moab. David became the armor-bearer for King Saul at the age of 25. He was best friend to Saul's son, Jonathan. David showed his military prowess in war with the Philistines, and by doing so won Saul's youngest daughter, Michal, as his wife. The days that David reined over Israel were 40 years. He reigned for 7 years in Hebron ( 18 miles south of Jerusalem) and 33 years in Jerusalem. Both Hebron and Jerusalem were in Judah. Bathsheba had been married to Uriah, the Hittite, a soldier for David. David had engineered his death in battle in order to marry Bathsheba. Nathan, the prophet severely rebuked David for this.
There was a terrible fight for the throne when David died by his sons.
- 1.Amnon, David's firstborn, born in Hebron to Ahinoam of Jezreel. ...
- 2.Kileab (or Daniel), second son, whose mother was Abigail from Carmel. ...
- 3.Absalom, the third son, born to Maacah, the daughter of Talmai, king of Geshur. ...
- ? Solomon, 2nd son of David and Bathsheba
- 4 .Adonijah, the fourth son of King David from Haggith (2 Samuel 3:4).
- Each of these 5 contenders to the throne were from different women. They were all half brothers.
- Amnon/Aminon was the eldest son of David by Abinoam, the Jezreelite. He became enamored of his half-sister, Tamar, and raped her. 2 years later, Tamar's brother, Absalom, had Amnon killed for his crime. (III Sam. 13).
Absalom was the 3rd son of David. He killed his half-brother, Amnon to revenge the rape of his sister, Tamar. Absalom exploited his personal popularity by stirring up a rebellion against David who was obliged to flee across the Jordan River. Absalom's army was vanquished and he himself killed by Joab after his long hair became entangled in a tree. His personality was one of vanity and rebellion.
Solomon, 2nd son of David and Bathsheba, who won the throne, succeeded to the throne before his father's death through the maneuvering of his mother, Bathsheba and the prophet, Nathan. After consolidating his position, he rid himself of his older brother, Adonijah, and other potentially dangerous individuals and both the Temple in Jerusalem in cooperation with Architects and builders sent him by Hiram of Tyre. The work was completed in the 11th year of Solomon's reign and ensured the central position of Jerusalem in the kingdom.
Adonijah, the 4th son of David, claimed the succession to the throne, with the support of Joab and Abiathar, the high priest, but was unsuccessful. Adonijah later sought to marry Abishag, David's concubine, but Solomon regarded this as an act of rebellion and had him killed (I Kings 1-2).
Solomon sat on the throne of his father, David, and mother, Bathsheba, and his kingship was firmly established. He reigned from 961 to 920 BCE, 41 years. To further consolidate his reign, Solomon married an Egyptian princess, his neighboring superpower, and brought her to the city of David until he finished building his house and the House of Hashem and the wall of Jerusalem all around. He will ultimately marry 700 women, mainly to keep the peace with neighboring nations, and have 300 concubines as well.
Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms, from the Euphrates River to the land of the Philistines, until the border of Egypt; they brought tributes and served Solomon all the days of his life.
Solomon's provisions for one day was: 30 kor of fine flour; 60 kor of flour (kor was from 67.5 to 120 gallons. Thus, 90 kor of flour was enough to feed thousands of people). 10 fattened oxen, 20 oxen from the pasture, and 100 sheep and goats, besides gazelle, deer, yachmur, and fattened fowl. For he ruled over the entire area beyond the Euphrates River from Tiphsah to Gaza, over all the kings of the area beyond the Euphrates River, and he was at peace with the land on all sides, roundabout.
Judah and Israel dwelt in security, each man under his grapevine and under his fig tree, from Dan to Beer-sheba, all the days of Solomon. 
To build the Temple, King Hiram of Tyre (part of today's Lebanon) and Solomon sealed a covenant. Solomon imposed a levy from all of Israel of 30,000 men. He sent them to Lebanon in shifts of 10,000 each month. For one month they would be in Lebanon and for 2 months each would be at home. Adoniram was in charge of the levy.
Solomon had 70,000 who carried burdens and 80,000 who hewed in the mountain (cut down trees), in addition to Solomon's 3,300 chief officers who were appointed over the work, who directed the people performing the work. The king commanded and they quarried great stones, heavy stones, to lay the foundation of the Temple with hewn stones. The builders of Solomon, the builders of Hiram and the Gebalites carved the stones. The people of Gebal, a city in northern Lebanon, were known for their masonry skills. They prepared the wood and the stones to build the Temple.
The Temple was built in the 480th year after the Children of Israel's exodus from the land of Egypt-- in 957 BCE, in the 4th year of Solomon's reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv (the spring month of Iyar) which is the 2nd month---he built the Temple for Hashem.
Solomon did not use iron tools because "The Temple was constructed in order to prolong men's lives, and iron implements are used to shorten men's lives, it is not fitting that the thing that shortens should be given power over the thing that prolongs." Rather than making large holes in the Temple wall for the beams that would support the annex's upper stories, Solomon indented the wall's thickness by one cubit at different levels to form ledges upon which to place the beams.
Where it only took Solomon 7 years to build the Temple, It took Solomon 13 years to build his own house, a palace. He also built the "House of the Forest of Lebanon; 100 cubits in length, 50 cubits in width, and 30 cubits its height, over 4 rows of cedar pillars, with cedar beams over the pillars. It was roofed with cedar overhead with 45 boards, 15 per row. there were also 3 rows of windows, opening opposite opening, 3 times. This "summer house" with many doors and windows to allow an ample flow of air got its name because of the many cedar pillars that were imported from Lebanon made it look like a forest. This royal summer home was built in the cool shade of the forest called Lebanon, first time we see the name as Hiram was the king of Tyre.
Solomon made all the furnishings for the Temple of Hashem: the golden Altar, the Table upon which was the showbread, of gold; the candelabra, five on the right and five on the left, placed in front of the Inner Sanctum, of fine gold; with their flowers, lamps, and tongs of gold; the jogs, musical instruments, bowls, spoons and pans were of fine gold; and the hinge-sockets of the doors of the inner House, the Holy of Holies, and those of the doors of the Temple, that is, the Hall, of gold.
Solomon gathered together the elders of Israel and all the heads of the tribes, the leaders of the ancestral families of the Children of Israel, to king Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the Ark of the Covenant of Hashem from the City of David, which is Zion. They gathered before King Solomon---every man of Israel---for the festival of Succos, in the month of Ethanim (Tishrei), which is the 7th month, all the elders of Israel came, and the Kohanim (Cohens) bore the Ark. They brought up the Ark of Hashem, and the Tent of Meeting, and all the sacred vessels that were in that Tent; the Kohanim and the Levites brought them up. King Solomon and the entire assembly of Israel that had assembled with him were with him before the Ark, offering sheep and cattle, too abundant to be numbered or counted. After building the new Temple, Solomon stored the Tent of Meeting (the Tabernacle built by Moses, within the Temple precincts. It was David who had prepared vast amounts of silver, gold, building materials, etc, that had been used in the construction of the Temple (I Chronicles 22:2-19) and Solomon now stored the leftover materials for future use.
Moses was born in 1391 BCE and died at age 120 in 1271 BCE. He started his teaching at age 80, which would have been in 1311 BCE. He had 40 years to teach the Israelites he rescued from Egypt about how to lived a civilized life. This was to be something like a huge science experiment in sociology. David ruled from 1010 to 970 BCE. That's a good 300 years from the time of Moses to the time of David to integrate the Mosaic Law into the Israelites.
Of course it depended on their ability to educate everyone to them. The Israelites had a good start with Abraham in the beginning, but much more was to be learned and practiced. The competition of those days were people practicing idol worship which included taking lives many times. Look at how Isaac was almost sacrificed by Abraham.
Naftali Bennett, Prime Minister of Israel 2021, born in 1972, Naftali Bennett is an Israeli politician serving as the 13th and current prime minister of Israel since 13 June 2021. He served as Minister of Diaspora Affairs from 2013 to 2019, as Minister of Education from 2015 to 2019, and as Minister of Defense from 2019 to 2020.
Our kings suffered from the same vices that we do today. There's very little difference except our technical skills have improved. That's what makes their life story so interesting. It was the habit of other nations to only allow writing that was flattering about themselves and their country, but here in our Jewish history, we see it all under the microscope; all the good and the bad are bared. It's so we have the choice of improving, after seeing the errors of our ancestors. Learn from the past both the good reasoning and the bad.
Resource:
The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia
Tanakh, Stone Edition (Old Testament Bible)
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